The Crow and the Butterfly
by StardustRose22
Summary: As the end of the world draws near, Max has an epiphany- only love can set you free.


Author's Note: So this is my first (and probably last) Maximum Ride one-shot. I really disliked the ending, I thought it was too simple for a storyline that started out so _perfect. _The title was inspired by the song "The Crow and the Butterfly" by Shinedown, (my favorite band since they came out) but the poem towards the end is mine, I'm a true poet at heart. Enjoy!

I guess in reality, I couldn't really be angry at Jeb.

I sat alone on the roof of our house, in the middle of the night. It's something I've taken to doing a lot recently. It felt almost right, with the cold and the dark surrounding you, choking you, making you feel numb enough to think that you're dead…

Jeb. My own dad.

It's been a roller coaster of feeling with him. I hated him, because he was a white coat, but at that point I didn't even know anything else. Then I cherished his very heart when he set us free, trying to be our father. I remember lying awake at night, wishing that he was.

When he left us, I think the real reason for my sadness was because I knew what it meant- twelve year old me, having to become a mother to children that aren't even mine. Not that I didn't have help- Fang and Iggy were there, and they did what they could. But it was always me making the choices, ones I shouldn't have had to make. But the love for Jeb never really left me.

Until I saw him in that lab coat, staring down at me in a cage again.

How someone could have so much bitterness in their heart, and so suddenly, was both beyond and genuinely scared me.

I'm sure that if I had seen my own soul, looking into fate's mirror, I would have been afraid of the black I saw. I clenched my fists and dug my nails into my palms. _Don't think about the hate, that's over now. _

Right. My soul isn't dark anymore.

But after everything we've been through, when I look at him…I see only dedication. Dedication to the kids he had sheltered, cared for, and loved so much. We all looked at Jeb with scorn, but I was getting sick of it.

How could I hate him when he was the one that always believed in me, never gave up on me, took a bullet for me, and has been standing by my side this whole time? I was getting sick of not speaking to him, bot letting the sun break through the clouds that had become our chains.

Jeb was my dad, and it was time I started acting like a daughter.

_Daughter…_

My mind eased into the thought of Angel. My sweet, corrupted little girl. She really was the epitome of ironic.

But, just like Jeb, I couldn't hate her. I just couldn't look into those blue, blue eyes and shut her out. I had to let her know I was here, and I was going to be anything she wanted me to be.

When we found her again, something gripped my heart like something trying to hold on, but realeased when we had her safe, back at home.

The thing that let go was my fear of Angel.

She had taken my place, tried to kill me, forced her thoughts into my mind…that little girl was scary. Those eyes, the little smile, white wings, they were all a mask, a way for her is disguise her heart. She had never learned that sometimes you just have to deal with life the way it is, and not believe that you were special. Everybody is the same.

And seeing her lost and scared made me realize that she is just like everybody else, and she deserves to be treated like it. Not like a goddess, and not like a freak.

_Angle was just a scared little girl. _

_And Angel isn't the only person that I've been afraid of. _

Dylan honestly scared me.

There was so much love in him, so much passion for a girl who barely even noticed him. You would think that if someone was afraid of their own hate, then another's love would be like the kiss of life to who they really want to be.

But that isn't the case if the love is meant for you.

I felt like I didn't deserve any kind of love, the way I had been recently. Especially not Dylan's. I'm the one who ran to Fang as soon as he got back, leaving Dylan alone in the dust.

I really did care for Dylan, but I just don't know if I loved him enough.

I don't even know if I loved Fang enough.

After everything Fang has and hasn't done, it was so confusing. One day he loves me, the next he leaves me to face the world outside alone.

He left me crying in tress, not sleeping, and writing poetry.

I had joked about poetry so many times before, but it really helps you open up your mind. I began writing angry poems and sad poems- heavy metal music and piano ballads-

_Falling like I'm out of control_

_I never even let you know_

_That it was broken from the very start_

_Don't put me back together if I come apart_

_Don't tell me that I will be alright_

_I know better, its always in my sight_

_It isn't iridescent in my core_

_But I'll put on the veil once more_

I know that I have to find a way to love. Without love, I'll simply fall apart. That's what the writing on my walls told me.

A secret that I've kept from the very beginning- I grew into my destiny, finally knowing that this what it.

To save the world.

No one ever said I'd be around to see it.

I stood up. It was time. Enough reminiscing, it's time to forget past mistakes. I didn't want to die with so much guilt, so much pain and darkness in my heart. That's why I left poetry for every one of my family members on the wall. Written in black Sharpie.

Nobody was going to take my words away from me.

Even as the scream caught me off guard, ripped from my throat.

I felt myself falling, spinning out of control.

I never got to tell them in person.

I had been so damn cold from the start.

I hope they don't lose themselves.

But I know I won't be okay.

I can see the blood with my own eyes.

I felt my soul leave me.

My eyes shut for the last time.

I took Hell for the world.

_No more. _

"_Max!"_

I had realized Max wasn't sleeping next to me, something we had started to do since I got back. It's not that I was a horny teenage boy, because, I mean I was, and Max is beautiful, but I just wanted to _feel _her. I wanted to smell her, hold her, never let her go again.

After watching Maya die, looking exactly like Max, I realized the truth. I belong with Max. She was the only one tough enough to be my girl, the only one emotional enough to make me feel like I wasn't with another me.

She brings out the best in everything I do, even what isn't right. So when I heard the scream on my way to see if she was in the bathroom or the kitchen, staying up late at night, my heart flew into my throat.

I knew she was on the roof then. I ran by Jeb and Dylan and Angel and everyone else, throwing myself out the window, letting the air catch me. The cool air pounded against my soul and coated my heart with an icy malice for anyone that may have hurt Max.

I landed on the roof, and that ice quickly melted into a need. A need for her to live, a need for her to survive, and need for her to hang on to me.

But when I got there, saw the blood on her white shirt, I knew she had found a way to let go.

Why didn't I get the chance to try again and say a second goodbye?

The real goodbye, the one that should have been said a hundred years from now, not when we were only fifteen.

My body froze when I heard them behind me. Eyes stared down lifelessly at the image of their mother, daughter, sister, lover.

"This is what they meant." Angel whispered, her voice thick.

"This is what they meant by '_Save the world, Max.'_"

Max had known all along.

I let everything I had within me go.

I hadn't left her room in two days.

I stared at the white washed walls, black ink scrawled all over them.

Her words, the so unique ones, meant for us.

I knew it was because of me she started writing. She made that very clear. How a fifteen year old girl had so many deep thoughts I didn't know.

But I stood there, and tried to figure out each and every one.

Not that it mattered.

Max was gone.

_I'm just a crow chasing a butterfly…_


End file.
